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Monthly Archives: January 2014

New Years Eve is always a strange day for me. Thirty eight years ago this evening my family became a part of Australian National Road statistics. My mother was killed. I suffered multiple broken bones, was rendered unconscious for five days and spent three months in traction. My siblings were also smashed to smithereens and…

Sufferers from red/green colour blindness might have trouble discerning the contrast between the jaunty orange of the Dubrovnik Cable Car and the dark green stripe of forest swathing the lower slopes of Mt Srd. Pam has good colour vision and we have been watching its rapid climb and descent occurring on a regular half hour…

Thanks to its constantly maintained and incredibly successful system of fortifications, moats and city walls Dubrovnik spent many centuries as an independent maritime republic. From 1358 when it seceded from Venetian rule until 1808 when the city surrendered to Napoleon’s all conquering army to prevent imminent Russian invasion this republic known in Latin as Respublica…

Despite the reputably blue skies that greet us the next morning I am loath to stir. Pam puts on her spurs and goes to work to rouse me. ‘Get up you lazy B’ she exclaims, ‘no rain, no excuses, no problems, we are going to the beach’. She has been reading Rick Steves’ guide book…

Dubrovnik television has a channel that during frequent programming breaks is almost completely devoted to a live shot of the Stradun that runs the length of the lowest part of the Old City. Pam has challenged me to streak down the main street late at night to show the Dubrovnik citizens a full moon however…

Dubrovnik’s new dawn continues our sensational run of great weather. Blue skies greet my upturned face as I poke my head out of the bedroom window shutters. I have slept late, Pam has already been out and about and I find a bag of tasty fruit from the local street market on the table when…

Winter is allegedly the season of stark cold savagery in Europe. Two soft poorly prepared Aussies like Pam and myself need to hole up somewhere to avoid the worst of it. Where better than Dubrovnik Croatia, Pearl of the Adriatic. Dubrovnik is a beautiful old coastal city in the far south of Croatia. The Old…